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what more voluminous and flowing than those of Alcman, were arranged on the triadic system (p. 211). In other words two broad melodies, each of up to a hundred notes, alternated, one always coming twice in succession, the other once. The alternation helped to stave off monotony, but it must be remarked that the songs were so long as to contain (in one case, at least) fifty triads or more, so that one of the melodic schemes would have been repeated over a hundred times. The performance must have lasted well over an hour. It used to be assumed that these works were sung by a chorus, but it now seems altogether likelier that Stesichorus sang them solo, accompanying himself on the kithara. Possibly there was a chorus that danced while he sang.45 |
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We hear that Stesichorus used the Harmateios ('chariot') nomos, which was primarily auletic, deriving from Olympus. It was high in register, and identified with the nomos of Athena, which was in the Phrygian mode and the enharmonic genus. It is consistent with this that Stesichorus refers to one of his own songs as a 'Phrygian melody'.46 If we interpret this as proposed earlier (p. 332), the implied scale is d e f a b c' d'. |
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He says that his Phrygian song is appropriate at the beginning of spring. This may be taken to mean that it is performed at a set festival. Those who considered Xenocritus' songs to be dithyrambs or paeans evidently saw nothing out of place in the performance of heroic narrative songs in a ritual setting. |
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The Corinthians believed that the dithyramb originated at Corinth in the time of their dictator Periander (c. 625-585), and that it was invented by the celebrated Lesbian citharode Arion, 'the first man we know of who composed a dithyramb, gave it this name, and taught it (to a chorus) at Corinth'.47 This suggests that the Corinthian dithyramb may have involved a singing citharode and a chorus who sang in response to him. The formal pattern of leader (exarchos) and answering chorus was an ancient one, well established in cult.48 |
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45 On all this see CQ 21 (1971), 302-14. |
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46 Glaucus ap. ps.-Plut. De mus. 1133f, schol. Eur. Or. 1384 (i. 220. 1-5 and 25 Schw.; Etym. Magn. 145. 25ff.), Phot. Lex. a 2835; Stesich. PMG 212. Cf. CQ 21 (1971) 309-11; JHS 101 (1981), 125; for the nomos of Athena, above, p. 216. |
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47 Hdt. 1. 23, citing Corinthian and Lesbian sources. Hellanicus included Arion in his Karneian Victors, FGrH 4 F 86. Arion certainly did not invent the name 'dithyramb': it occurs earlier in Archilochus, and is obviously old, perhaps pre-Greek. Pindar acknowledges Corinth as the home of the dithyramb in Ol. 13. 18. |
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48 Cf. Il. 18. 51, 316, 24. 720-76 (lament), Archil. fr. 120 (dithyramb), 121 (paean), Sappho fr. 140 (Adonis drama). |
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